The Way We Fall

  So I’ve been doing all the cooking, such as it is, and I let her decide when she feels like talking to me. Small offerings. If I could think of something better, I’d do it.

  I didn’t hear from Gav all yesterday. This morning as I was putting away the breakfast dishes, there was a light knock on the door. When I opened it, he was standing on the front step with his shoulders slightly hunched and his hair rumpled, looking just as wary as he did the first day he came to my house. For a second it felt as if nothing that’d happened since then was real.

  “Hey,” he said, and I said “Hey” back, and then I reached toward him instinctively. He caught my hand and stepped inside, interlacing his fingers with mine. He held my gaze as if he was searching for something. After a moment he leaned in to kiss me. And I was pretty sure that it had been real after all.

  I slid my other arm around his waist, and he eased back slightly. “I’m sorry I didn’t come sooner,” he said. “I went by Tessa’s yesterday afternoon, and you were gone. I wasn’t sure where to look.”

  “It’s okay,” I said. It didn’t seem worth mentioning our awkward conversation on the phone the night the power went out. “I figured if you didn’t find us before then, I’d see you at the hospital when I went in today. How’s Warren?”

  Gav shrugged, but his jaw tensed. “As comfortable as they can make him,” he said. “They give him a little aspirin for the fever, and tea and mint candies to help his throat, but I guess that’s about all they can do anymore.”

  “It’s not their fault,” I said. I suspect Dad would swim across the strait during a snowstorm if he thought they’d give him the medications we need when he got to the other side.

  “I know,” Gav said. “And it’s not like any of the specialized drugs made a difference before. Maybe the real cure’s been mint all along.” He tried to smile, but his mouth wavered.

  “I think it’s been hard for him,” he added. “His dad took his little sister to stay with their grandparents in Dartmouth and didn’t make it back before the quarantine. And his mom’s afraid to go in the hospital. He’s had to make do with mostly just me for company.”

  “You think he’d like me to come by again?” I said. “I’m happy to visit more—I just wasn’t sure how he’d feel, since he doesn’t know me that well.”

  “I think he’d like that a lot,” Gav said, and really smiled. “I was going to head over there after I’d seen you—why don’t you come too?”

  So I did.

  They have Warren in one of the smaller rooms that used to be an exam room when the hospital was operating normally. An elderly woman was lying on the exam table, having a sneezing fit as we walked in, and a boy who was maybe ten sat against the wall and kept pausing his handheld video game to scratch the top of his left foot. Warren was sprawled on a folded blanket on the floor, his back propped up against a pillow, a book open on his knees.

  “Kaelyn!” he said when he saw me, and raised his eyebrows at Gav. “Got tired of coming on your own, eh?”

  Even with the mask covering his face, I could tell Gav was grimacing at him.

  “I keep telling him to stay home,” Warren added, to me. “If you want to catch that thing, this is the place to do it. But like always, he ignores me.”

  “I always listen to you when you say things worth listening to,” Gav retorted, and Warren grinned at him for a moment before he started to cough. He picked up a mug beside him and sipped his tea until the cough subsided.

  I had to grope for something to say that had nothing to do with the virus, or the hospital, or anything else depressing. Finally I settled on, “What’re you reading?”

  “This political thriller someone left here,” he said. “Not really my genre, but there aren’t many alternatives.”

  “There’s a library on the second floor,” I said. “It’s small—really just a closet—but they try to have a little of everything. What do you want?”

  His eyes lit up. “Where would I start?” he said.

  He kept up the same cheerful tone as he suggested authors and topics: “Politics is fine, as long as it’s nonfiction—but not biographies, political biographies are even worse than this.” That sort of thing. Like it was no big deal he was there, like he’d just caught a bug that would clear up with some rest. But the truth is, he’s been sick nearly five full days, which means chances are he won’t be himself by tomorrow, and I could tell he knew that just as well as I did. His hand shook whenever he picked up the mug of tea, and his eyes flickered away from us when he laughed. And any time he mentioned the hospital, or alluded to being sick, his smile got bigger.

  Gav and I weren’t the only ones wearing masks. I watched Warren hold up his with jokes and banter, and a sharp little pain dug into my chest.

  He’s scared, like anyone would be. I don’t know how much of the cheerful act is to boost his own spirits, and how much is for Gav’s benefit, but it’s not really important. Because either way, there was nothing I could do except stand there and notice, and go upstairs to grab him a new book.

  And then I come back here and write all this down, like I would have recorded the habits of coyotes and my observations of seagulls before.

  Useless. So incredibly, completely useless.

  I found it! Oh my god, Leo, I really did! The answer was there the whole time. I just never looked back far enough.

  I probably would never have seen the connection if it wasn’t for Howard—that survivor who takes the bodies out of the hospital.

  I think he’s been living there since the electrical service went out. I went into the hospital kitchen this morning to boil some water, since we were getting low again, and he was there mixing up a glass of powdered milk to pour on his shredded wheat.

  I’d never seen him without his gurney. He’s taller than I realized, I guess because he has to bend over to push it. And even though his hair’s mostly gray, up close you can see he’s not that old. Younger than Dad—in his thirties, maybe.

  I said hi, and he said hello, and it was a little awkward because I don’t know anything about him other than what he does for the hospital, which isn’t exactly a great conversation starter. I filled up a pot and put it on the stove, and he picked up his bowl and headed out into the cafeteria. That was when I noticed the way he walked.

  “You okay?” I said. “You’re limping.”

  “Oh,” he said. “That’s nothing new. ’Bout a year ago, I was working with the boats, managed to drop an anchor on my foot.”

  I winced and said, “Ow!”

  “Yeah, it smashed my toes up good,” he said. “Couple of them didn’t heal straight, that’s why the funny walk. Had a hell of a fever afterward, too.”

  “A fever?” I said, and memories from our summer trip to the island last year rushed into my head. The two days right before we went back to Toronto, when I was stuck in the hospital here, feeling like I was on fire.

  I’d been by the water when it happened, just like Howard. Cut my heel on a mussel shell as I was climbing onto the rocks after a swim. I’d never thought the two might be connected. Dad had said it was probably something I’d eaten.

  I turned off the stove and ran out into the hall without another word. Howard must think I’m insane.

  But the truth’s there in the hospital records. Five of us who survived the virus, we were in the hospital between April and October of last year with a bad fever. I’m sure the other guy must have had it too—maybe it just didn’t get bad enough that he needed treatment.

  Having that fever protected us. Kept us alive. Which means if we can figure out how, there’s got to be a way we can keep other people alive too.

  Dad must have missed the connection for the same reason I did. Too focused on the virus itself, not bothering to check back beyond the start of the epidemic.

  I have to talk to him. I looked all morning, but I couldn’t find him. Nell said he might have gone to the research center, but the doors were locked when I checked there. I’ll go back aft
er Meredith’s had lunch. The sooner he knows, the sooner we can do something.

  Finally. I can’t believe I found it!

  I had to wait until this morning to write this. Last night all I wanted to do was scream. I don’t think I could have held the pen without snapping it in two.

  That connection, the fever, it doesn’t mean anything.

  No, that’s not true. It means plenty. It just isn’t going to help us in any way at all.

  Dad didn’t get back to the hospital until the evening. I was so excited I didn’t even ask him where he’d been. I dragged him into the records room and pulled out the files. I couldn’t talk fast enough, as if I had to explain everything as quickly as possible or he might stop listening. I had this idea that maybe, if he knew soon enough, we could save Warren. I could already see Gav’s face lighting up when I told him.

  After a minute, Dad put his hand on my shoulder. “Kae,” he said. “Kae.”

  He must have said my name three or four times before I really heard him and forced myself to stop.

  “I know,” he said. “I saw it as soon as we had our first recovery.”

  I stared at him. I felt like I’d run smack into a wall. Like a bird that soared toward what looked like open air and crashed into a pane of glass.

  “So why haven’t you done anything?” I asked. “All the people who caught that fever beat the virus! Isn’t there some way we can use that?”

  I knew if there had been a way, Dad would already be on it. But I’d been so sure, so relieved. I couldn’t let the idea go without a fight.

  “At first we weren’t certain there was a connection,” Dad said. “Our second survivor said he didn’t get sick at all last year. And by the time the third patient recovered, I’d already looked through the files. The fever isn’t a sure indicator, Kaelyn. Not even close. If it was, I wouldn’t have been so worried about you. But there are other people who came down with the fever last year, who caught this virus and died. From the information we have, I’d say the previous infection raises chances of survival to about forty percent.”

  “Forty percent is a lot better than the zero everyone else seems to have,” I said. “Do you even know what caused the fever?”

  “Yes,” he said. “No one had identified it at the time, but the doctors kept samples, and we analyzed them again after the epidemic started. It was a virus. A virus that was an earlier form of the one we’re facing now.”

  Right away, I understood. “That’s why having the fever before made a difference,” I said. “We were already a little bit immune.” Then the rest of what he’d said sank in.

  “If you have samples of the old virus, of the one from last summer, you could give it to people who haven’t been sick yet, right?” I said. “Maybe it wouldn’t help people who’ve already got the new virus, but anyone who hasn’t, like Meredith and Gav and Tessa—they’d have a better chance.”

  “I wish we could, Kae,” Dad said. “Maybe if we’d known in the very beginning. But with the hospital in its current state, we don’t have the resources available to make sure people survive even the less potent form of the virus. Without proper medication, the fever might be fatal on its own. At the very least, it would weaken a recipient’s body and make them more susceptible to the mutated form, despite the partial immunity. You and Howard and the others had a year or more to recover before your immune system had to fend off the new virus. I talked the idea over with the doctors and the Public Health Agency staff, and no matter how we look at it, the risk just doesn’t balance out.”

  “So it’s useless,” I said, my shoulders sagging.

  He shook his head. “It did help us in the early stages,” he said. “If we hadn’t been aware of the illness last year, and didn’t have the samples to compare, we wouldn’t have been able to isolate the new virus as soon. Or to start the blood tests and work on the vaccine.”

  Blood tests that just confirmed what people already knew. A vaccine that, if it worked, had never returned to the island. But that wasn’t what stuck out to me.

  “What do you mean, you were ‘aware of’ it?” I said. “Did you already know I wasn’t the only one who’d had the fever—that it wasn’t just food poisoning?”

  “Nell asked for my professional opinion after I brought you in last year,” Dad admitted. “She was concerned because the patients in the previous cases hadn’t been responding quite the way she expected. I told her to monitor the situation carefully. All of the patients had recovered, but it was obvious we could be dealing with something unfamiliar, and we had no way of knowing how the disease might evolve.”

  I jerked away from him. “You were worried whatever caused the fever might turn into something worse,” I said. “You kept asking me if I was feeling okay—you weren’t sure it was totally gone. You knew something like this could happen before it even started!”

  He looked at me like I’d pulled a knife on him. “It was a condition we’d never seen before,” he said. “Any responsible scientist would have been concerned. But we couldn’t predict the future. We did everything we could with what we knew, Kaelyn.”

  “No you didn’t,” I said. “You could have told the hospital to call in Public Health back then, and maybe they’d have found a way to deal with the virus before it got this bad. You could have said we had to stay in Toronto last spring instead of letting us move back. And then none of this would have happened, Mom and Drew would be okay, everything would have been okay!”

  I was yelling by the end, and then my voice broke and I almost burst into tears. Dad said something, but I didn’t want to hear it. I just left. Marched out to the car, slammed the door, and leaned my head against the steering wheel. And then the tears leaked out.

  I know I wasn’t being totally fair. Of course the hospital wouldn’t have called in the national health agency over a dozen people with a fever. No one could have known how the disease would change. And if we’d stayed in Toronto, it wouldn’t have made any difference to the virus. Rachel’s dad would still have gotten sick, and Rachel, and everyone after, exactly the same, except Dad wouldn’t have been here to help, and everything would have been even worse for the island.

  But it would have made a difference to us. Mom would still be alive, and Drew would still be with us, and we wouldn’t be living like this. I’d be able to walk across the hall right now and hear Drew’s fingers clattering away on his keyboard, see Mom standing in the bathroom putting her hair up for the day. I wouldn’t have to wake up every morning and remember that they’re not here anymore, and feel the pain hit me all over again.

  I’m not sure I can forgive him for that. Right now, I don’t even want to.

  Do you know three months ago I honestly believed that all I had to do was change how I acted, and everything in my life would be okay? That asking myself, “What would the Kaelyn I want to be do?” would solve all my problems. Remembering it now I want to laugh.

  What would the new me do? I’ve pissed off the only friend I have left and she might not ever totally forgive me, and I don’t know if my boyfriend is really my boyfriend because we aren’t in a position to do normal boyfriend-girlfriend things like go on dates and have conversations that aren’t about disease and starvation, and Mom is dead and Drew’s missing and most of the other people on the island are dead too, and we still don’t know how to cure this horrible unstoppable virus so it’s going to keep killing more, and the mainland has just about abandoned us, and there’s a gang going around shooting people and setting fire to houses and stealing stuff, and as of today only one of the pumps in the gas station has any fuel left, so soon we won’t even be able to use our cars for protection.

  On days like this, the me I am wants to curl up in the corner with my arms around my head. There’s no part of me that isn’t scared. There is no me that knows what to do. I’m already doing my best, and that’s all I’ve got.

  Gav showed up at lunchtime today with a box of macaroni, a jar of pasta sauce, and a black eye.

>   “What happened?” I asked as I let him in.

  He headed straight into the kitchen, threw the food on the counter, and grabbed a pot. “My fault,” he said. “They told me Warren started hallucinating last night. But I said I was going to see him anyway. He didn’t know who I was. And whoever he thought I was, he really didn’t like.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said, which seemed totally inadequate. Gav smiled at me a little painfully before he started poking through the cupboards. I pointed him to the spice jars.

  “Thanks,” he said, and kissed me so quickly I hardly had time to feel it. Then he busied himself sloshing water into the pot and jerking around the knobs on the stove. Every movement said he didn’t want to talk. So I left him to his cooking.

  By the time the pasta was ready, he seemed calmer. He still didn’t say very much, though. The four of us plowed through the meal with less than ten words between us. When we finished, Tessa said she’d take care of the dishes, and recruited Meredith as her dryer. Gav looked around and said, out of nowhere, “You can see the mainland from here, can’t you?”

  We went up to Meredith’s room, and I handed him the binoculars. “I’ve managed to spend at least a few minutes watching every day since we moved in here,” I said, trying to sound hopeful. “Hard to see much, but lights go on at night, so there must be people around.”

  “Patrol boats are still staked out,” he said.

  “Yeah,” I said. “I think they’ve moved closer to the mainland than they were before—because of the weather probably. But all week I haven’t seen them budge.”

  For a while he just looked. Then he lowered the binoculars and set them on the window seat.

  “The first time we talked,” he said, “you told me the government was going to look after us. You still think they’ll come through?”

  “They have to do something eventually,” I said. “Eventually someone’s going to ask why they haven’t heard from us in ages, and try to see what’s happened.”